


A Strange Idea of Courtship

by A_Writing_Pen



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-22
Updated: 2016-06-12
Packaged: 2018-04-16 13:15:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 7,607
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4626609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_Writing_Pen/pseuds/A_Writing_Pen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aveline and Fenris have a conversation about their roundabout ways of courting their partners.</p><p>A short collection of my fenhawke oneshots from related fandom weeks.</p><p>Lastest update: Day 7 and Day 1 of Fenris week added.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Strange Idea of Courtship

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for Aveline Appreciation week and Fenhawke week. This one-shot was written with a gender neutral Hawke in mind.

“So I’ve heard you and Hawke are back together again.” Aveline said, leaning back in one of the few stable chairs had left.

  
Her routine visit was more celebratory than usual, it was less than a week since Fenris finally killed Danarius. She brought with her a bottle of spirits and the good news that he would never have to worry about his claims on the mansion again. With Danarius dead, there was nothing to refute Fenris’s claim on the building. It was a congratulations on both parts, Fenris for his freedom and security of his crumbling estate and for Aveline the knowledge that she wouldn’t have to carefully change her patrols in the area anymore just for his wellbeing.

  
The mansion was still decrepit and falling apart, but the home felt lighter somehow. Since she had last visited the floor had been swept, some of the cobwebs were gone, and the table in standing between them was actually dusted. When she lifted her gloves off the table she didn’t come away with fresh a coat of dirt. In less than a week, Fenris suddenly seemed to care that his home was in order.

 

“You two have had a strange courtship.” She said.

He laughed awkwardly “It seems we both have experience with that.”

“It does seem that way.”

The spirit Aveline brought for Fenris was on the table, a gift for finally being a free man with Danarius dead. She had been told by Hawke that she had a fine taste for spirits, and frankly she thought something else besides wine might be a good change for Fenris. It was from that bottle that Fenris poured another cup for himself and Aveline.

“So…” she said

“So?” he said.  
Aveline sighed, her armor clanking as she crossed her arms. She wondered how Varric might handle this then gave it up, she could never figure out that dwarf she certainly would not now.

“How are you two? How did it go starting again after three years?”

“No.” Fenris said, tone flat and sharp, before taking a drink.

“Would you rather Isabela and Varric asked? At least I’m not as scandalous as them.”

“They already have. Repeatedly. And with great imagination in their answers when I gave them none.”

They were quiet. Where the rest of their companions were better at pressing conversations or luring out the answers they wanted, Aveline preferred the direct approach. But like on her patrols, she knew there were times to wait and let things happen at their natural pace.

“Do you regret waiting so long with Donnic?”  
Aveline’s surprise showed on her face. It was not the question she expected, but she thought a moment before giving her answer.

“Sometimes, at first. After getting past the fear it was a relief to just have everything in the open and I have been happy with Donnic ever since. But I don’t regret the time I took. Not just because of Wesley; I needed to relearn that I could start again. I needed it and I believe Donnic and I better for it, even if we fumbled at the start.”

“I see.” Fenris smiled.

“Take your time, Fenris.” She laughed taking a look at the room again. Fenris had more books on a shelf and possibly, she peered in the semi-darkness that always seemed haunt the mansion no matter the time of day, one of Hawke’s old belts. “Or don’t. Whatever you want.”

Aveline stood up, it was time for her to return to the barracks. Fenris nodded looking forward to their next meeting.  
Before Aveline left she turned at the door, “And Hawke already told me everything.”


	2. Carry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Garret/Fenris PROMPT- Fenris broke his foot and now Hawke carries him everywhere. He won't put Fenris down. Fenris is not pleased.

Hawke struck down the last of the Lowtown thugs. They had ambushed Hawke and Fenris just after they had left the Hanged Man.

Hawke was making some poor joke when the Lowtown thieves sprung onto them. Some new start up guild that if they hadn’t attacked Hawke and Fenris that night, would have quickly been squashed by another upstart rival guild. Then again if they, mostly Hawke, hadn’t been so obviously drunk they probably never would have been attacked. Hawke shouldn’t have struggled as much as he did in the fight, more so fighting his own coordination then the actual thugs. Fenris fared better from his high tolerance and his broody demeanor was rarely diminished by anything. Before he was overwhelmed Hawke last saw Fenris landing a mighty blow on the unfortunate thug in front of him.

Hawke was still catching his breath from the fight when he hadn’t heard the elf complain about how Hawke had let his guard down. He didn’t hear any grumbling at all which in itself was unsettling. The reason for Fenris’s silence became clear when he turned around; Fenris was still on the ground, conscious but not getting to his feet.

“That bad?” He asked as he waked to Fenris.

Fenris’s sword was lying next to him but he didn’t show intention to grab it or get up.

“I know youre not that drunk. You outdrank me at your mansion last time, I still don’t remember getting home.” Hawke held out his hand to help Fenris up. He didn’t take it.

"There is a much worse problem.” Fenris said.

Then Hawke saw it. When Hawke saw Fenris deliver the blow he jumped up as always to strengthen the force when he landed. But at the same moment another thug tried to attack from behind. He noticed the second bandit a moment too late, and in an effort to strike back he sprained his ankle and only aggravated further by the rest of the fighting. In the few minutes since the impact transpired, Fenris’s right foot had already swollen larger than the other and was beginning to bruise.

“What did you do? Kick those bandits till you broke it?”

“You are not helping.”

“Alright. Alright.”

Before Fenris could say anything, Hawke lifted Fenris into him arms bridal style. The fight had sobered him quite a bit, but Hawke stumbled with the additional weight and quick motion. Fenris hissed at the jolting motion.

“Fasta Vass!” Fenris said.

“Sorry.”

“I don’t need you to carry me.”

“Really? Flex your foot then.”

The glare Fenris gave would have made anyone else wither. Instead Hawke laughed at the hate aimed at him. Fenris tried to flex the foot but he was only able to wriggle the last few toes before he let out a small grown. The foot would not take any weight.

“See. You’re not walking anywhere.”

“This wouldn’t have happened if you had been on your guard.”

Hawke snorted. He made no move to put Fenris down, who cursed in Tevine a while longer.

“So.” Fenris was resigned in tone. “Are we just going to leave my sword behind?”

The sword was still on the ground, too cumbersome for either of them to carry but most likely to be picked up by thieves if they left it.

“You can’t by chance carry it?”

“Not when you hold me like this.”

Hawke sighed and very awkwardly while holding the annoyed and injured elf tried to crouch down to pick up the sword. He had to kneel and lower Fenris until he could grab the oversized sword, Fenris offering no help as he kept his arms crossed over his chest.

“Well this is elegant.”

“I will drop you.”

Fenris clamped his mouth shut.

“If you could, please?” Hawke asked.

Fenris picked up his sword on the ground. They solved their little problem by carrying the sword on Hawke’s back. Once that was dealt with, Hawke started walking in the direction of Darktown.

“Where are we going?” Fenris asked. Hawke started dreading the headache more than the one in the morning.

“Anders’ Clinic.”

“No.”

Hawke kept walking.

“You’re hurt and need a healer.”

“Not from that abomination.”

“Well I don’t have an injury kit or any potions. Unless you could suddenly make a healing spell out of those markings Anders it is.”

Walking to Darktown meant they were more likely to face more thugs. Even though he was more clear headed now, carrying Fenris would make him a target if he wasn’t careful but they had faced worse.

“This wouldn’t have happened if you didn’t go everywhere barefoot.” Hawke said.

“This wouldn’t have happened if you knew how to parry.”

It was going to be a long walk.


	3. Pranks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Fem!Hawke keeps playing dumb pranks on Fenris and he gets annoyed. Everyone else thinks it's hilarious.

It happened at Hawke’s estate. Four years since she had arrived at Kirkwall and Hawke was still adjusting to her new home meaning that she was breaking in the estate by having drinking nights for the band of six. Leandra was outside of the estate visiting Gamlen.

Merrill arrived with Varric and Isabella, the two having walked her from her home in alienage so that there was no chance she ended up walking into Darktown by herself again. Anders arrived soon after. Fenris was the last. By the time he arrived, a round of wicked grace had already gone by.

He walked in stiff, his sword and armor clean but still guarded as if he was going to face a row of bandits rather than a hand of cards. A stifled giggle came from Merrill as he walked in. When Fenris glared at her she sheepishly tried to hide behind her hand of cards, the effort only made her look more suspicious. Fenris stopped before he reached the table, about to comment when the others cut him off.

“Decided to be fashionably late broody?” Varric said.

“Oh-oh. I had something. Wait. No. I think I lost it. No, it was probably stupid.” Merrill said.

“No worries, Kitten.” Isabela said,

The quips went around the table, more than once with Varric and Isabela leaving especially barbed but light-hearted comments. Hawke simply said.

“Fenris, could you grab something for me in the kitchen.”

Fenris looked back at her with suspicion.

“Don’t you have a man servant for that?”

“Think of it as a penalty for being late.” Fenris thought he saw Isabela wink, probably some innuendo he missed.

He grumbled as he hesitated a moment before he started walking over to the kitchen. When the crossed the threshold of the doorway he tripped over the fishwire tired on both ends of the doorway. The table erupted in laughter.

"Oh. Did you see that? Did you see that? I thought I was going to give it away.” Merrill said, her voice light as she breathed between laughter.

Fenris quickly got his feet but the damage was already done. Everyone at the table was red in the face. He cursed in Tevine and was headed towards the door.

“Oh, don’t be that way. Sit down.” Isabella said, motioning to the seat next to her. Fenris still clenched his teeth and didn’t take a step.

“If you really want to get back at me, make me pay for it in Wicked Grace.” Hawke said. The way she looked down at her cards made Fenris think that doing just that was unlikely. No doubt she had already cheated her way to an overpowering hand. Isabela pushed the deck in front of him as Fenris took a seat. Out of the corner of his eyes, he thought he saw her deftly hide a card near her bosom. Without another word he played the round and lost terribly, but didn’t feel as frustrated as he expected.

The next incident Fenris didn’t get over so quickly. Hawke had come over to the mansion carrying a covered basket and a bottle of wine. Fenris had mentioned at another meeting that he was down to his last few bottles. The bottle Hawke brought had been trojan horse in hindsight. He drank too much, that was stupidly clear in the morning. Not because of headache but because he had not thought anything of what else was in the basket or why Hawke had gone missing for a time saying she wanted to “look around” the old place. It was the smell in that morning that made him wonder.

First he thought it was the bodies. Not the original ones when Hawke helped him take the building in search of Danarius. Those had been dealt with long ago, though perhaps not as quickly as most people though. These new ones, Hightown bandits that thought the mansion was abandoned and perfect for looting. Fenris had left the corpses only for two nights, when he first took the mansion he had left the slavers bodies for longer. Hawke had told them to get rid of them, he couldn’t blame her for being right.

But even after he removed the bodies, cautiously because even he knew that carrying dead bodies in the middle of Hightown would bring more attention than his tattoos ever did, the smell still lingered. It smelled of fish, spoiled fished.

He spent the day searching from top to bottom but he still couldn’t find the source. He tossed out the broken debris, cleaned out the cobwebs, and burned the moth eaten blankets but the smell still lingered.

After cleaning out the entire first level He found the source of the smell hidden behind a pile of crack wood where the ceiling had caved in. There he found Hawke’s basket filled with spoiled fish. He gagged when he opened the lid and a stronger wave of the smell greeted him. The smell lingered for hours after.

When Hawke knocked on his door, for a scouting mission a week later, he still hadn’t forgotten the incident.

“You left spoiled fish in my home.”

“Oh, you noticed?” She said. “The place looks cleaner than it did before.” She said glancing at what she could from the doorway, no new dead bodies or broken pots and tiles cluttered the entrance this time. A new layer of dust had settled on the floor but the place remarkably cleaner than it had been in years.

“I had to in order to find your basket.”

“So you wouldn’t mind going with me to the docks then?”

“More fish!” he said, Fenris gauged on the words.

“It thought you’d be used to it by now.” she had a glint in her eye that showed the devious gears in her head were moving. “ Or I could drop off a new basket now and again for you so you can keep your place clean.”

“How dare-”

Before he could finish, Hawke had already turned and started walking in the direction of Lowtown. “Docks before nightfall.” she waved.

Fenris chased after her, damned if he was going to let her pull the same stunt again.

Fenris would find small things stashed away in his house. Usually dull shivs, torn trousers, or dirty bottles in place of various old things of Danarius. Usually small tevinter idols, useless documents, or any other item that could be easily carried out but not missed. The largest item that ever went missing was a portrait of a magister that was replaced by one of Isabella’s crude drawings. When Fenris discovered the drawing he imagined the two rogues taking turns drawing the obscenity trying to up the ante. He laughed quietly to himself before taking the drawing down.

The things that brought little annoyances became endearing overtime. They fell into a rhythm. Hawke would brank, and he would scowl, but not for long. The tricks, while sometimes embarrassing or frustrating were harmless, playful even. Fenris still had a short temper, but with these little annoyances no longer crept under his skin.


	4. Bargains

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Technically, this is after Strange Idea of Courtship from Fenhawke week, but it’s not necessary to read this entry. Thank you for reading.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for Day 3 of Fenris Week.

“I look on you now and I think you received the better end of the bargain.”

Varania had said those words a week ago, and still they left a disquiet in his soul. The years he spent as Danarius’s pet, the waking pain of the ritual that had wiped everything he ever was before that point, should have been enough to prove her wrong. Why should anything she said take any place in his mind at all—she had called herself his sister then betrayed his trust once she took his coin. As far as Fenris was concerned, he had no sister before and he did not have one now. But still her words echoed.

Maybe the coin was the problem. All these years she thought her brother some Magister’s pet, then suddenly he was writing her letters, living far away from Tevinter and sending her coin. If her story was to be believed, then on the surface it looked like he had gotten the better bargain or broken free of it entirely. Did Danarius embellish the story, ignoring Seheron entirely, saying he left in the night with half a fortune? Why did he care?

Aveline had visited the other day, and it was clear he had some type of future with Hawke. Begrudgingly, he had settled his life in Kirkwall or the city had settled into him while he was unaware. He had a place to call his own, friends (some he would even call family), and more than anything the chance to start anywhere. If he looked at his life through her lens, then he had made off better. In his own perspective, he was starting to think that he may just have.

“I think that’s ridiculous,” Hawke said when Fenris told him his thoughts. They were in Hawke’s library resuming Fenris’s reading lessons, though the topic had long gotten away from them. “Just because you’re happy now doesn’t mean you somehow cheated her. If anything you tried to do the same for her by the sounds of it.”

Fenris looked back at the page he had been reading, trying to decipher if a particularly difficult sentence.

“Are you happy?” Hawke asked.

“Something like it.” He said, then flipped the page.


	5. Listen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For a slave, listen but never be heard. Never repeat what was spoken or reveal that it was understood. Listening could save a slave from a whipping or even death—knowing how best to soothe the master’s temper before he exploded or when best to disappear entirely. Leto learned this early, Fenris had to relearn.

For a slave, listen but never be heard. Never repeat what was spoken or reveal that it was understood. Listening could save a slave from a whipping or even death—knowing how best to soothe the master’s temper before he exploded or when best to disappear entirely. Leto learned this early, Fenris had to relearn.

Feneris understood the common tongue and the remnants of old Tevene from the beginning, even if he never remembered his mother’s tone of voice or the way she enunciated or compacted her vowels. He awakes with pain. From the point where his memory begins, everything is pain, forever associated with Danarius, and the desire to never feel that pain again. Pain is a motivator for listening, because of the hope of finding a way of ending it. There are no words he hears to end it, only those to prolong it.

“I did not throw a tournament to find a useless specimen. Keep going until I tell you to stop.”

He forgets most of these words later, but the sinking feeling in his chest remains burned into his flesh along with the lyrium.

Listening lets him find the key words, ones that will bring pain or reward. He can tell the difference when his Master curses in the common tongue or Tevene, weaving through both tones like water--when he is pleased and what is a true compliment verses a barb at little dignity he has, simply by how long the sound is drawn out. Most often, he hears his own name--a combination of neither, disgust and shame so muted that it is an anocrym for all of his parts, but he can no longer find the root or meaning. Made a whisper without origin.

In Seheron he learns to listen not to save his own life. He pieces together the fragments he remembers from the streets of Minrathius, from the intelligence reports Danarius would spit at in frustration because the language was too difficult and uncivilized for him to waste time on, but in war the meanings become simpler. Words meant hostility or fear, inattentive boredom or wariness. Listening to the slightest change in tone could signify the death of his master if he isn’t fast enough. The slight pitch of surprise is enough time to save his master from a spear and tear out the attacker’s throat. But he is not fast enough to react to the second assailant he hears shout a war cry.

His master is wounded from an attack he could have prevented if he had paid enough attention. If he had noticed where the second Qunari had gone instead of focusing only on the first, he could have easily prevented this. He will not let his master die here in a jungle full of words and whispers he can only half understand. The ship is at the port, about to embark on the retreat homewards. A Magister of Danarius’s caliber is easy to find a space for on the overcrowded ship. The slave, like the cargo they tossed overboard to make the shift’s retreat swifter, is not. When it leaves the harbor and is safe from the reach of the Qunari’s grasp, he feels relief at having saved his master at least.

They come from all sides. A jumble of commands as they encircle him. A soldier cried out in fear, then pain as he sees Fenris’s hand ghost through him, then mortally remove his heart before his eyes. Another balks in disgust while the other attempts to side swipe him in hysterical rage. He loses the advantage of their surprise quickly and is overwhelmed as the other three overtake him. By chance, he recognizes one word before the world turns black. “Saarebas,” he hears Danarius say in a poor imitation of the Qunari’s perfect tongue, then throws out the intelligence report before burning it, “what a stupid thing to call mages.”

What he hears when he wakes is foreign to him. The high pitch of the voice and the way it soothes him like some half-remembered dream bewilders him. The cooing is the sound of someone comforting him, perhaps the way his mother had if he had any reference point to compare. It scrambles all the information he has, Qunlat means enemy but the tone is kinder than anything he has never known back home. His wounds are bandaged and stitched as best as possible, and his worst wounds are wrapped in a salve to prevent infection and numb the pain. The owner of the voice, a human with skin covered in white paint, lifts his head and brings a bowl of some type of herbal broth to his lips until he drinks.

The fog warriors speak a dialect of Qunlat amongst themselves. As his wounds heal, he listens to a new range of meanings he had never known possible. He latches on to conversations around him as they speak switching in and out of the common tongue on untranslatable terms. The fog warriors have even begun to teach him some of their language. His guardian says that he learns quickly, even though his accent is a bit strange. He tells Fenris how they found him, nearly dead from the Qunari attack, when they arrived in their mist, taking out the remaining soldiers. By mere chance, the fog warriors had been trailing the same group that attacked Fenris, and had saved his life in the outcome. An enemy of the Qunari was an ally of theirs. He hears the tales of past generations, of the fog, of the ancient halls of wisdom lost in the war, of how Seheron, despite the Imperium’s and the Qunari’s belief, is not enslaved to either hand. They are a battered but free people, clinging to the edges of their origins that is all but lost to them.

He hears Tevene again when his master returns. It is when Danarius, flanked by fog warriors curses. Fenris is frozen, even as he hears his name called out once, then twice. His body cannot be urged to move, that is until Danarius gives the order to kill them all. It is the oldest enchantment he knows that propels his body to move and cleave down the people who had been more a home to him than any place he has ever known, and Danarius has not had to lift a finger to enact it. From the moment he was named, or even the day he was sired into this misbegotten world that crafts some into slaves and others into slavers, he was made to heed the word of his master, mage or not. But it is seeing his the dead bodies of the fog warriors that he goes deaf to all words, and runs.

He knows the meaning of traitor in every language.


	6. The Ties that Bind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The moment when all of Fenris's bonds in Kirkwall became something more.

The dwarf is the first one to make an effort. Practiced and suave, Varric invites the ragtag group for a night at the Hanged Man on the eve of the deep roads voyage. Fenris thinks it is the worst idea. Not only does he hardly know these strangers, an unsettling amount turned out to be mages, but the inevitable hangover will make the descent into the Deep Roads far more dangerous. Not all the people here will go into the Deep Roads, but they are all a part of Hawke’s inner circle, whatever that will mean for him. For the remainder of the night Fenris hardly drinks, but he is less begrudging of the card game they teach him and the stories, nearly all fabrication, that the dwarf tells.

At some point, Fenris no longer mind’s Sebastian’s sermons. Sebastion rejects that his talks on the maker are sermons, but to Fenris it is all the same. Fenris is wary of these conversations, but still it is a comfort in his earnestness, even if it most of what he speaks is syrup to comfort the weak and the oppressed. One day he finally takes up Sebastian’s offer and visits the Hightown chantry during service. He does not pray and hardly listens to the priest and leaves early, but he feels an unmistakable levity that lasts until he returns to the mansion. The next time Sebastian starts speaking about the Maker, he feels lighter.

Isabella is equally as guarded as Fenris, she simply plays it better than he does. She flirts, misdirects conversations that ask too many questions about her past, and is all too quick with her daggers. If no one is watching, or sometimes in plain sight while giving him a wink if he notices, she cheats with abandon at Wicked Grace or pickpockets someone when they are too drunk to notice. When she feels particularly inclined to make him happy, she pickpockets Anders, though she avoids it now after one particularly disastrous incident with Justice. One night after the Qunari invasion, she tells him about the slave cargo, the one that she freed and the one that she let drown. There is no tact behind the conversation, at least not one that he could discern. With the help of the poor house ale, Isabella gets through her tale than stares at him all too soberly, “I’m not asking you to forgive me.” He believes her.

Fenris can’t remember a time when someone actively protected him. As much as she complains, Aveline changes the roster just to make his life a little easier. She warns him of who to avoid and suppresses complaints from the nobles about his presence. Donnic is a good fit for her and he asks about his well-being on her behalf on the nights Fenris hosts Wicked Grace at his manor. Fenris never thought he would be hosting friends at his place, but finds himself enjoying it even when loses the entire pot.

Merrill is naïve not to even understand what she has given up, and when the time comes he feels no sympathy for her. After they slay the last of the Dalish, his words to her harsh, so much so that even the others are taken aback. The walk back to Kirkwall is solemn and silent. Months later, after Danarius is killed and Hawke and Fenris have decided to try again, Merrill says quietly to him, “When my clan died, you said ‘Let’s hope the sacrifice of someone who cared for you isn’t wasted.’ I hope it never is a sacrifice.”

Anders has never been his friend and neither he nor Fenris had the illusion they would be. Other than fulfilling the same mission, they rarely see eye to eye on anything. Then the chantry explodes and so does everything he has built; the makeshift family around him and even the mansion he spent the past seven years in is destroyed by the debris and fire. Sebastian is the first leave when Hawke refuses to kill Anders. It is the beginning of the end of their small collective, and Fenris does not know if he will have anything like it again. He hates Anders, when he sees the red light, for proving him right about mages; for pushing Sebastian away; for making Aveline and Donnic choose between Hawke and their duty; for risking all their lives and forcing them on the run again. But when he sees Anders lower his head, waiting for the knife that never comes, he remembers Seheron.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I felt it was best to leave Hawke out because there's enough Fenhawke fanfiction that already shows why that one is special.


	7. When I Remembered You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fenris Week Day 7  
> "We played in our master’s courtyard while Mother worked. You called me…”  
> Young Fenris/Leto day. Before the lyrium. What are some headcanons you have about Leto’s life? Have a fic about his relationship with his mother and Varania?

Mother is always tired. Leto notices that she moves slower, not enough to keep her from her work as a laborer, but enough that he can see that picking up the wicker basket pains her. Her hair has started greying sooner than other women her age. She has changed so much in just a few years time. Leto is old enough to work with her now in the fields, along with his sister Varania. Varania started in the fields at the same times as Mother, putting an end to their playtime in the master’s courtyard.

Their work is hard and by the end of the day he is sore. From the herbs in her wicker basket, Mother makes a salve to heal the blisters on his hands until they harden and calcify like hers. Until two years ago, Mother used to work in Master’s kitchen making the food, inspecting every plate before they were sent out to Master and his guests. Sometimes she would set them on the table herself during servings, though she said she preferred to stay far away from the magisters. When Mother worked in the kitchen, Leto and Varania had better meals and could play in the courtyard as long as they didn’t make too much noise and disturb master’s guests. They played later in the day before sundown because Varania was starting to be trained to work in the kitchen with Mother. Then one day, Mother said she and Varania no would no longer work in the household and would start working in the fields. The same salve Mother applies to Leto’s hands was the same one the other slaves taught her to maker for herself and Varania.

Now that Leto had grown, he could haul heavy loads to the main house or plow the fields, but he preferred to work on the same plot with his Mother and sister, hacking or replanting the many crops that feed the household and Master’s experiments. He noticed that Mother always kept Varania close, even when they were assigned to different tasks. The supervising slave always sent them together, even if Leto was left behind. Leto was curious, but he feared the whip securely tied to the slave’s hip more and Mother never answered his questions. Varania simply grew quiet and asked him to talk about something else.

After the salve is applied, Leto is not allowed to touch his palms or pick up anything until it sets. The salve itches and has the pungent smell of spindleweed. He hates the salve, but Mother spent so long mainge it when all she wants is to rest. More of the salve is on his hands this time because he accidently slashed his palm when he was cutting down a difficult stalk. Leto’s eyes watered from the stinging pain when Mother applied the salve to the wound, careful to cover the entire surface.

“How is my boy to become strong if a simple healing salve hurts him so?” She says, with tenderness and worry that she alone has mastered.

She wraps a cloth over the wounded hand, both to stop his scratching and to protect the wound. He feels dumb and hindered under the fabric but says nothing. Mother always goes to bed early when she can and he knows she would be in bed already if not for his wounded hand.

Leto is ready to sleep too, it is well past dark but his hand throbs too much to sleep. All three of them sleep together in the same room, the straw mats lying on the floor only inches away from the door and their outside cooking stove for their meals. He lays on his back on his bed, palms upward hearing Mother’s easy breathing. Then Varania shakes his shoulder, his eyes adjusted enough to the dark to see her signal to be quiet and follow her outside. Bewildered he follows.

She covers his mouth and shushes him when he steps outside, smoothing the question on his lips. There is no moon that night and they are standing by the backwall of their small home, out of sight from the other small slave homes and anyone who would be walking by is asleep.

“Show me your hand.” She whispered.

He offers it to her and Varania wraps it in hers and a faint glow emits from her hands. The throbbing dulls then altogether disappears. When she releases his hand, he unwraps the cloth and finds no wound, and doubts there would even be a scar in the morning.

“Put it back on like it was before or Mother will notice.” She said.

“How do you know magic!” Leto said.

She shushes him again, louder this time.

“Mother told me not to tell or show anyone,” Varania she says in a quieter whisper.

“You could join the Circle,” he says, breathy with wonder at the possibility, “maybe even become Liberati.” Her eyes widen in horror.

“Don’t you ever say that!” She pushes him to the wall, hard. “Mother says that’s why Father’s gone. They found out what Father was and took him away.”

Fenris had no memories of their father. Most slave children were missing at least one parent if not both since it was not uncommon for families to be sold apart, especially if the Master did not allow them marry, and even worse if a Master decided to sacrifice one of their slaves to fuel their magic. Varania was older and probably remembered him as more than just a ghost that Mother never spoke of. This news is groundbreaking for him, but not as much as Varania’s magic.

“So no one but Mother knows?” Leto asked.

“The one who teaches me. Mother gives him some of her food and does some extra work.” Then her face contorts in an expression like guilt, “One of the serving girls saw me burn a dead chicken by accident. I don’t know how she kept her quiet but we couldn’t work there anymore.”

A missing piece falls into place in Fenris’s mind and he understands why Mother kept Varania close. Why sometimes Varania would be away on errands that Mother never explained. But still he was uncertain of one thing.

“Why not use your magic to escape?”

“Leto stop talking about this. You have to swear to be quiet. I already wasn’t supposed to tell you. Leave it alone, or you’ll make things worse.”

He promises, but two years later, Fenris hears about the tournament. He joins dreaming of the boon that will free his family because he thinks that is the best way to preserve his family without secrets or charms.


	8. Reunion at Weisshaupt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fenris and Hawke finally reunite at the Warden fortress.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one has been sitting as a WIP forever. I've gone over it so many times and I still have problems with it, but I'm finally willing to inflict it upon the world.

After weeks of travel and the treacherous climb up Broken Tooth, Fenris had finally arrived at the Warden stronghold, Weisshaupt. To pass the time, Fenris studied the room he was left to wait in. The Wardens had left him in the personal quarters of a commander, it was larger than the standard soldier’s quarters, his time in Guard’s Keep in Kirkwall told him that. The room was larger than the small hovels Fenris had been staying in. An unused fireplace stood opposite the bed and a small dresser was pressed against the back wall. A small table with a wooden chair sat in the space between the door and bed. On the floor, Hawke’s boots were scattered about instead of arranged neatly in a corner. Out of habit, Fenris placed them properly alongside the bed. The cloak Fenris had worn to hide his markings was thrown over the headboard, and he was half-inclined to put it on again and wonder the fortress on his own, when the door finally opened.

A figure entered, removed his hood and for the first time in a year, Fenris saw Hawke’s face. Even with a familiar smile, Hawke looked tired. Dark circles were beginning to form under his eyes from many sleepless nights. His beard had grown longer, giving him a haggard and unwashed look.

“They told me you had arrived.” Hawke said, removing his cloak and draping it over the free chair. He shut the door behind him.

“I was beginning to wonder if I was forgotten.” Fenris said.

“It’s gloomy in here.” Snapping his fingers, the candle on the dresser sparked to life, brightening the room.

Much closer, Fenris could see that Hawke’s face was beginning to develop harsh lines with sallow cheeks and sunken eyes.

“Maker, I missed you.” Hawke stepped closer and embraced him.

For a moment, the year apart was gone. Fenris had traveled so many miles for this, spent so many nights awake because he was afraid that he would rest only to wake alone until the final day when he never woke again. In a moment, Kirkwall had never burned and they spent their days in the Amell estate, but then they parted.

“Why are you with the Wardens?” Fenris said, anger rising up again like it had when he first saw the fortress. He watched Hawke’s shoulders fall, visibly dejected.

“That is complicated.” Hawke said.

“Do you think that is an answer?”

“I know.” Defeat crept into his voice as he gave a heavy sigh. Fenris had only heard this tone twice before, after Leandra’s death and when they left Kirkwall.

“Are you well?” Fenris said, softer now. He placed his hands with affection on the back of Hawke’s neck.

Hawke gave a wry smile. “I’m in the deep of it, as always.”

Hawke exaggerated a frown, tucking in his lower lip feigning a child-like sadness. Fenris tried to keep his face stern, and succeeded mostly, but he couldn’t hide the faint curl of smile at the edges of his mouth. Hawke smiled when he saw it.

“I want an answer.” He said, tone flat and serious now. Hawke’s smile faded.

“I’ll have to start at the beginning then.”

Hawke shrugged off Fenris’s arms and sat on the edge of the bed and offered Fenris the space next to him. When he didn’t sit, Hawke started the tale. He went over again what had happened at Adamant, what the Wardens had done, and Corypheus’s involvement. Fenris already knew the generalities of these details from Varrics’s letters, though he did not know how long Hawke had been in contact with Stroud or how deeply red lyrium or blood magic was intertwined in the plot. Lastly, he told Fenris about the Fade.

“It was…unlike the time before.” Hawke said. The candle had burned to half its original height, but Fenris didn’t feel the time pass.

Fenris looked away, even though he scolded himself for doing so. Hawke saw it, but said nothing. They both remembered.

“We were all there, physically in the fade, but it felt solid this time. I dream of it every night, but it had never been that clear before, everything was as you and this room. Stroud, the Inquisitor and party, and I fell through a rift when the bridge collapsed at Adamant. It saved our lives, but we had no means of returning the way we came. It was right there, the black city, we could have walked through it.”

“Like the ancient Magisters.” Fenris cut in, spitting out the words like poison.

“I’ve been there, done that when it comes to unleashing an evil force upon the world, frankly.” Hawke said. “May I continue?” Fenris nodded.

He went through the entire story. Finding the spirit of The Divine, or whatever remnant was left of her, the creatures they saw in the fade, and even the graves they found naming their own fears. He intentionally said nothing about what the fear demon had whispered to him. Then they reached the final standoff with Nightmare. Even with all six warriors, the battle was grueling; demons were difficult to contend with once they had clawed their way in the waking world, but to fight them in their own territory was all the more dangerous. The onetime Fenris had faced a demon in the fade he succumbed to its promise. If it had been a fear demon instead of a pride demon back then—he didn’t want to think what could have happened.

“We thought we defeated it and we were so close to the fade rift that would bring us back to the real world, but then Nightmare returned. The Inquisitor had to make a choice, someone had to stay behind in order to cover our retreat—”

“Stroud stayed.” Fenris said.

“Yes, he did. For the Wardens.”

“And what were you willing to stay in the Fade for?”

“I won’t answer questions for what didn’t happen.”

“You would have left me alone. Nothing to bury, only this scrap to remember you by.” Fenris said, holding the weathered red favor in his hand. It was now faded from too many battles and kept in a small pouch instead of on his wrist to protect it from falling apart altogether. “I wouldn’t have even known what happened to you. Did you even think of me?”

“You were always in my thoughts. Believe me.”

Hawke held Fenris’s free hand; Fenris intertwined his finger’s in Hawke’s.

“You still can’t forgive yourself for their deaths.” Fenris said. Hawke wouldn’t meet his eye, but still held his hand.

“There’s trouble here. I had no idea how bad off the Wardens were before I arrived, and as an outsider they don’t trust me. Thank the maker Carver is with Aveline.”

“Why should they? The Wardens may have needed the Inquisition at Adamant, but there has to be a higher command somewhere on this continent.”

“They were decimated, Fenris!” Hawke raised his voice, standing now. “No one was left. Their leaders were either sacrificed or died facing that damned dragon in the end. I’m barely running anything, but the ones here who saw their command become corrupted, it’s the least thing I could do. The last thing I can fix.”

“You don’t always have to save the world!” Fenris pulled his hand away.

“Coryphaeus was my responsibility. Red lyrium is my fault. My brother is a Warden and I won’t let him fall with the rest of them.”

“Coryphaeus is the Inquisition’s problem and so is red lyrium. The Wardens can fend for themselves and you said yourself Carver is safe with Aveline.” Hawke glared at him, but Fenris had far more practice.

“Stroud is dead because of me.”

“The Inquisitor made the choice.”

“Stroud died because of me.” Hawke repeated, louder this time. “Before you start about how Coryphaeus isn’t my fault again, and he is, I still could have stayed behind after the Inquisitor choose. Nobody forced me to step through the rift. I could have stayed behind. It’s not that I wanted to leave you. I just had to, for once, not make the world worse off than when I found it. And if it wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t be here in the center of whatever disaster is about to take place.”

Then he removed an arrow from the inside pocket of the cloak he had slung over his chair. It was broken in two pieces and the arrow head was slightly damaged as if it had hit something hard. Otherwise, it looked the same as any other arrow.

“This nearly killed me while I was returning here, if I had been walking a step slower it would have been in my eye instead of a tree.” The arrow looked like a bolt fired from a crossbow. It was meant for killing, not hunting. “It’s not the first attempt either. Until we get to the bottom of it, the wardens are restricted to their quarters. Many of them, especially the ones not at Adamant are unhappy about an outsider taking any kind of authority. It won’t be long until they try more aggressive means.”

Instead of a closed fist hitting the side of his head, Hawke felt Fenris’s hands run through his hair, the sharp edges of his gauntlets running across his scalp.

“You do not need to face this alone.” Fenris said.

“I am yours.’ Hawke said.

A heavy knock pounded on the door, urgent and armored. It was a Warden from the sound of shaking metal with every knock.

“Serah, Hawke! We’ve found something that needs your urgent attention.” One of the Wardens said from the other side of the door.

Hawke cursed softly, then felt Fenris’ hand leave his hair. Instead Fenris had grabbed his sword and cloak at the same time Hawke grabbed his stave. They raced out of the room together.


End file.
